


When the Bell Thunders

by shefrommo



Series: Four Great Church-Bells (Red Sun of Carnage) [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: BEHOLD, Don't worry if you're confused, Great-Grandpa Hector is Sir Not Appearing in This Fic, I sincerely hope that when you picture that last interaction in your head, It's not contrived coincidence when it's a result of Orion's currently unspecified powers, Multi, Part one of the series Four Great Church-Bells (Red Sun of Carnage), The Exposition Chapter draws near!, The rest is coming, This will eventually be a published book, hopefully, it comes off as creepy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-13
Updated: 2020-06-13
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:00:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24701212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shefrommo/pseuds/shefrommo
Summary: 5,000 years ago, humanity staged a successful rebellion against their gods. All that's left of that time period are four bells, a tablet containing a related prophecy, and four humans with monsters sleeping under their skin.Solaris Nuit, the Red Sun of Carnage, has long since died and been reborn. Orion Johnson, his modern counterpart, is lucky enough to be at ground zero when the second bell thunders and the prophecy begins to come true. After centuries of waiting, the chance to go up against the gods has arrived. Now if only he could find someone to fight that wasn't his resident headache.Told from the perspective of the Red Sun of Carnage.
Relationships: Original Male Character & A Literal Force of Nature, Original Male Character & His Family, Orion Johnson | Solaris Nuit & Orion's Family, Orion Johnson | Solaris Nuit & War | The Horseman of the Apocalypse
Series: Four Great Church-Bells (Red Sun of Carnage) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1785751
Kudos: 1





	When the Bell Thunders

**Author's Note:**

> I'm proud to say that this is my first work here on AO3. I hope you enjoy it!
> 
> Originally posted on 6/13/20  
> Minor edits done on 6/25/20

When the Bell Thunders  
Part I of Four Great Church-Bells (Red Sun of Carnage)

Orion Johnson trudged inside the first exhibit room, trailing behind his parents and younger siblings. His twin sister, Rhea, looked every bit as bored as Orion felt, while their younger sister Cassandra walked next to Mom, at least pretending to be interested in her work. Dad was holding Troy’s hand, to stop Orion’s little brother from running all over the place.

Mom had made it clear when they were in the entrance hall that just because she and her coworkers had put some stuff out on display did not mean that that stuff was for touching or poking or, heaven forbid, climbing on. The displays were all several-thousand-years-old artifacts recovered from the Atlantis Expedition, after all. They were both priceless and fragile.

The Atlantean Exploration had been extremely interesting as far as the history, anthropology and archeology sections of the science community were concerned, but Orion personally found the entire thing to be rather unnerving. He couldn’t imagine wandering into the old ruins of a long-gone city, much less taking stuff out of it.

Most people didn’t feel the same about it—clearly, since the Atlantean Bell Committee, more commonly known as the ABC, was dedicated to studying the recovered artifacts. Even most of Orion’s family didn’t feel the same crawling unease as he did. Mom worked for the ABC, hence why they got the special tour on “Bring Your Family to Work Day,” and both Grandma Proserpina and Grandpa Jason used to work there. Great-Grandpa Hector Torinetti had been both the expedition’s leader and the founder of the ABC. 

Still, as Orion crossed the first exhibit’s threshold, he shuddered. Even the air in the ABC’s building felt chokingly thick and charged with tension, and that was with the air conditioning unit going full blast. The ABC building only had a few artifacts out on exhibition, too, which only made his nerves worse. Frankly, the whole building felt cursed, and Orion would know better than just about anyone else alive how that felt. He just didn’t see how nobody else could feel how wrong it was that the artifacts had been taken out of their millennia-old resting place.

Up ahead, Orion’s seven-year-old brother, Troy, was running around the open room. Mom pulled him away from a table before he could crawl under it. She then began to explain the purpose of this room’s exhibit. “So, this tablet you see off to your left,” she waved to a large stone slab in a clear display case, “was recovered during the original Atlantean Exploration. The script is in what we’ve taken to calling the Atlantean dialect, which is rather like Ancient Greek.”

Fourteen-year-old Cassie wandered over to the table and picked up a pamphlet.

Dad asked, “Does that mean you know what it says on there?”

“Is it even legible?” Cassie mumbled, leafing through her new acquisition.

“It is legible,” Mom said, “and we’re translating it. The alphabet is similar to Ancient Greek, but admittedly the syntax is different—Atlantean seems to have its own unique grammatical structure. What we’ve translated so far suggests that the tablet hosts some sort of doomsday prophecy, rather like the Mayan predictions about the end of the world.”

Cassie looked up at that. “A prophecy?”

Rhea elbowed her twin, Orion, and then whispered, “How much do you want to bet that it’s predicting the end of the world?”

“That’s a sucker’s bet,” Orion told Rhea. “Mom already said it’s a doomsday prophecy. Do I look like an idiot?”

“Kind of,” she shrugged.

“Yes,” Mom said, a little louder than was necessary. Rhea and Orion turned back to listen in again. “It talks about something called the War of Rebellion, wherein humanity rebels against their gods and wins. When that happens and the gods return, four bells—which we will see shortly—will ring. Or perhaps it already has happened, and we’re only waiting on the bells to ring. Or maybe both events have already happened. It’s still unclear whether the events have happened, will happen, or if we’re only waiting on the bells. Whatever the case, it’s said that when the gods die or are sealed away, magic will vanish from the earth.”

“Magic,” Rhea repeated, rolling her eyes. “Right. Like that exists.”

Cassie said, “Well, ancient civilizations did believe in magic and in gods. Like Zeus, taking on several different forms, or Ariadne’s magic string that showed the way through the Minotaur’s labyrinth. It wouldn’t be surprising that the Atlanteans believed in multiple gods and magic.”

Orion said, “I bet that the war’s already over and the magic is gone. That’s why we don’t have any.”

“Magic is a fairy tale,” Rhea said.

“Is not,” Orion said, just to annoy her.

“Is too,” Rhea said.

“Is not.”

“Is too.”

“Is not—”

“That’s enough!” Dad snapped. “Stop arguing, both of you. You two are almost eighteen, you’re too old for that nonsense.” He stooped down and grabbed Troy before their younger brother could sneak under the rope cordoning off the display case.

The twins quieted down as their parents and siblings moved onto the next room.

Rhea leaned over and whispered into Orion’s ear, “Is too,” and then hurried to walk next to their mother.

Orion glowered at her back but didn’t dare try to yell at her again. Before he left, he stopped to look closer at the worn stone slab. It was in considerably worse shape than it had been the last time he’d seen it. Something scarlet caught his eye—he stopped looking through the glass display case and started looking at it. On the surface of the glass, his reflection had begun to distort, turning blood-bright red and lengthening. Orion turned away from it before it could finish changing and hurried to catch up to his family.

Then Troy shrieked, “Grandma! Grandpa!” and charged at an elderly couple standing next to a set of four bells.

Proserpina Torinetti-Smith turned, caught her youngest grandson and stooped down to hug him. Her husband, Jason, who was nearly a whole foot and half shorter than his wife and shrinking in his old age, didn’t have to bend over to add himself to the hug.

Cassie sped up to hug them as well. “Grandma! Grandpa! I didn’t know you guys were here too!”

Jason laughed. “Pina and I used to work here, too, you know. We decided we’d come and check on the old place. It would be nice if Pina’s dad could come, but Hector’s getting a bit too old for wandering around for a couple hours in the ABC. Anyway, how are you guys? Enjoying the sights?”

“It’s very interesting,” Rhea said, as though she hadn’t spent the entire ride there complaining about not wanting to spend her birthday weekend looking at dusty old rocks.

“I’m impressed that they translated the doomsday prophecy tablet in the last room,” Orion offered and joined the group hug. “Isn’t that a really old language? And a previously unknown language at that? How’d you guys read anything off that old eroded chunk of stone?”

“With great difficulty and years of study,” Proserpina said, then stood to hug her daughter and son-in-law. “Diana. Silas. How are you two doing?”

“Just wonderful, Mom.” Mom said as she and Dad embraced Proserpina.

“How long have you guys been waiting?” Dad asked.

“Not long. We just got to this room, actually.” Jason answered.

“Ah, okay then. How are your knees? I hope you haven’t gotten all stiff again. I’m not sure that there are any chairs here,” Dad fussed.

Jason waved him off. “I’m fine, I’m fine. My knees lasted me eighty-three years; they’re not going to give out now.”

“Says the man who got out of knee surgery four months ago,” Mom pointed out.

Jason pretended to clean his ear. “I’m sorry, did you say something? My knees aren’t going bad, no not at all, but my ears on the other hand…”

Proserpina swatted at his arm at the same moment Mom and Rhea said, “Dad/Grandpa!”

“That joke isn’t funny,” Cassie informed him. “Neither is the ‘I stayed up all night making this clearly-McDonald’s-fast food for you’ joke.”

“He’s a grandpa, Cassie,” Orion said, “That’s like three different levels of dad. He’s supposed to have awful dad jokes.”

“Three?” Troy repeated.

“Yeah,” Orion nodded. “He’s Mom’s dad, he’s Dad’s father-in-law, and he’s our granddad. That’s three.” Changing the subject, Orion looked over at the bells. “So, what’s this exhibit about? I’m guessing these are the bells from the tablet back in the other room?”

Half the room was taken up by the display case. Inside it were four large bells. The largest nearly brushed the ceiling, it was so tall. There was only about a foot of space between the ceiling and the top-most part of the bell. The second largest bell was about three-quarters of the first one’s height. The third bell was half the size of the first. The fourth and smallest bell was the size of a church-tower bell.

This smallest one was terracotta, barely coming up to Orion’s hip when he stepped closer to the display. It depicted four human-sized figures riding horses. Each one was naked and bore an animal skull instead of a human head. On one figure, there was a crow’s skull and two blue mosaic tiles were set into the eyes. The second bore an ox skull and had two yellow mosaic tiles for eyes. A third had a rat skull for a head and had green tiles for eyes. And the fourth, the one on the side of the bell not facing the viewers, had a ram skull with blood-red tiles in the eye sockets.

Orion paced back and forth in front of the case, craning his neck to get a better look at the bells, fourth one first, and then the second and first ones. He checked out the third one last; it was the least important. He breathed in carefully through his mouth—the air was thick and faintly coppery on his tongue, but that was a good sign. The bells were all in good condition. A little beat up, a little dented and chipped, but still serviceable. Still functional.

“These are indeed the bells from the tablet,” Proserpina said, coming to stand next to Orion. “As you should know by now, the Atlantean Expedition’s greatest finds were the tablet in the previous room and these bells. The bells are supposed to ring when the gods are slain.”

“Well,” Mom corrected, “there’s actually a new translation of the tablet circulating.”

Movement near the floor caught Orion’s eye, and he glanced down. The shadow under the fourth bell was stirring, changing from a dark splotch on the ground to a vivid scarlet. Orion tried not to scowl at the rising shadow. While nobody else there would see it, he was aggravated by its presence. Earlier, he’d looked away from his reflection before the spear-toting menace could fully manifest, and now the nuisance was showing up again just to bother him. Didn’t Orion get enough nagging and petty annoyances from his siblings?

“Oh, there is?” Jason sounded surprised. “Well, I suppose it has been several years since we retired. I guess it shouldn’t be so surprising that they’ve made some headway in translating the tablet.”

Mom smiled at him, then continued. “I’m not yet certain how accurate the new translation is but the tablet seems to indicate which bell will ring under what circumstances. The bells, as you can see from the artwork, depict a strange series of creatures. These, we believe, are the Atlantean gods.”

“They made naked artwork of their gods?” Cassie asked doubtfully, leaning over to peer at the smallest bell. “Isn’t that blasphemous?”

“I’ll get to that in a minute,” Mom said, “although it should be kept in mind that this was artwork associated with a tablet prophesizing humanity’s successful rebellion against the gods. At any rate—”

Mom gestured to the first and largest bell. It was decorated in strange drawings of vaguely humanoid creatures with grossly distorted limbs. Each one either seemed to be passing through a rectangular object or lining up to pass through. The way it was decorated, however, made it look almost like the end of the line was coming out of the rectangle. “—the largest bell, the one with the gods travelling through a doorway, says that it will ring when the missing gods return.” 

Mom then turned and pointed to the second largest bell. Unlike the rather rusted bronze bell before it, this one looked like it had been carved from stone. On it were depicted more of those strange creatures, except now they were lying on the ground on their stomachs. Their lower bodies were attached to the floor, but they raised their torsos and heads from it. Thin lines like ropes extended from their necks, representing the chains that bound them in place. “The second bell, the stone one with the gods tied to the floor, says that it will thunder when the sealed gods break free from their chains.”

The rising shadow began to form a blood-tinted haze above the floor, but Orion was determined not to pay any attention to the whiny toddler he called a prisoner, so he turned to look at Mom instead. Though his tenant hadn’t fully manifested, Orion could hear, just faintly, the irritated huff that signaled the force of nature had noticed that Orion had his back to it.

“Next is the third bell," Mom said and turned to the third largest bell. It was impossible to tell what this one was made of because the whole surface was covered in remarkably well-preserved mosaic tiles. The creatures from the two larger bells made a reappearance, this time lying underneath long pillars. A horizontal line across the mosaic clearly indicated that the creatures were underneath both the pillars and the ground. Their arms, however, jutted up from the ground into the mosaic’s faded blue air. “This,” Mom said, “is the one with the mosaic of the gods piercing the earth from under their tombstones. That one will scream when the dead gods are raised from their graves and brought back to life.”

Mom waved to the bell Orion was standing in front of. He obligingly moved out of the way. “Which brings us to the fourth and smallest bell. As you can see, this is the one with the four unidentified naked people. The artwork here is particularly unclear.”

“Unclear how?” Dad said. “It looks pretty clear to me. All these bigger bells show images of the Atlanteans’ gods, and the people on the fourth bell don’t seem all that human. Aren’t they just more gods?”

The haze took shape, becoming an unnaturally tall figure in a scarlet robe. No skin was visible, save for the head, which was a ram’s skull. The sockets were dark, empty pits. In one hand, it wielded a bloody spear, and the spearhead looked alarmingly like it was made of bone. Orion side-eyed the spear, before looking the ram-headed figure dead in the eye sockets. He didn’t verbally address it, lest his family think he was talking to thin air, but he silently dared his prisoner to take a swing at his head again with that puny, pointy walking stick it was holding.

Wisely, War set down the spear, whereupon it immediately vanished in a puff of blood-scented air. Then War turned sad eyes on Orion. “I wasn’t going to hit you with it,” it said mournfully, “I just thought it went well with my nice robes.” The force of nature did a little spin to demonstrate its robes.

“Well,” Mom said, “according to the tablet, the depictions on each of the bells are the circumstances in which the corresponding bell will ring. Rather useful, I suppose, if you don’t think that the tablet and its handy-dandy instruction manual will survive in the future. That means that the creatures depicted are the Atlantean people’s idea of what their gods looked like.”

Orion rolled his eyes. War had a great deal of tactics designed to annoy him, but the recent fascination with fashion was probably the most frustrating of all of them. Orion didn’t intend to let War know how much it annoyed him, but the problem with chaining a force of nature to his soul was that the force of nature had insider knowledge on how Orion felt. And it made use of that info at every opportunity.

Mom sighed and ran a hand through her hair. “However, that’s not the case for the fourth bell. The tablet says that the first bell will ring when the missing gods return and the second will thunder when the sealed gods break free. The third will scream when the dead gods are raised, but the fourth… the fourth will sigh, very quietly, when the four Apocalypse Maidens pass on and their burdens are let loose upon the world.”

“Which,” Proserpina said thoughtfully, “would imply that the creatures on the fourth bell are not the gods but are instead the Apocalypse Maidens.”

“But they’re naked,” Cassie said, “and they don’t have any boobs or anything. They don’t look like girls.”

“Ooh, good point,” War said. “We aren’t girls. We aren’t men either, for that matter. Unless you intend for us to take the gender of our prisons and our prison wardens?” It made a strange gesture that Orion interpreted to be the equivalent of a mocking elbow nudge. “Which would mean that you yourself are a woman. Why, I didn’t know that you were so maidenly, Mr. Macho Warrior Sir.”

Orion glanced at his younger sister Cassie, “Why should the pictures be of the Maidens in the first place? Why can’t it be the burdens they bear? And why is it ‘maidens’ anyway? Why not, I don’t know, super awesome swordsmen or archers? These people were supposedly fighting against the gods, so why not have warriors instead of maidens?” And where, Orion wondered, did the carvers even get the idea that he and the other three Living Seals were maidens in the first place? None of them were female.

“Wait, I just had a thought,” War said. “Do you think this robe is fashionable? Or is it dreadfully out of date? Should I put my old armor on instead?”

“Why not maidens?” Cassie asked back immediately. “What’s wrong with women saving the day from the big bad deities?”

“Well, who’s ever heard of a bunch of nuns beating up a literal force of nature incarnate?” Orion retorted. “They’re warriors. Male warriors, too, since nobody in antiquity ever let women pick a fight.”

“Women are vicious,” War said with a shrug, “so you never know. The female of the species is always the most dangerous, after all. And you would know that, wouldn’t you? Your first wife was a delightfully terrifying woman. Every wife you’ve ever had over the course of your many lifetimes has been. You’ve always been a massacre waiting to happen, Solaris, and I guess you have to have all your loved ones be the same.”

Orion clenched his jaw and thought very hard in the ram-headed figure’s direction, practically shouting his thoughts into its head. He was proud of that trait in himself, had to be, seeing as he’d willingly sealed Conflict Incarnate within himself and that meant fighting off every scrap of control War tried to exercise over him. That didn’t mean, however, that Orion wanted his family to be the same.

Mom interjected before Cassie could respond. “The Atlantean word used to describe the fourth bell is typically used in Ancient Greek to indicate unmarried women. Since most of the words are similar, if not identical, to Ancient Greek words, it’s generally assumed that they have the same meaning. Atlantis wasn’t that far from the other Ancient Greek nations, so it would make sense that it shared the words, if not the grammatical and syntactical rules.”

The ram-headed figure huffed indignantly and stepped over the rope separating the display from the walking area. It then draped itself over Orion’s back, resting its bare-bone skull on Orion’s head. Orion set his shoulders and ignored the weight. If War was going to be a dick, then Orion was going to ignore him for the rest of the day.

“Well,” said the ram-headed nuisance, “if you’re not going to pay attention to me, then I’ll get someone else to.” Then it reached out to touch Rhea.

Orion swatted the hand away from Rhea quickly. When his twin looked at him strangely, he said, “There was a fly.”

War paused, and then asked, a touch more seriously than before, “Was that crossing a line?”

Yes, Orion thought. War and its corruptive, corrosive magic had better stay far away from Orion’s family. As far as it could, anyway, since it was stuck with Orion.

War hummed, and the noise sunk into Orion’s bones, shaking him in time to the buzz. “Sorry,” War said, “I don’t mean to threaten you or your loved ones.”

Orion wished it would go back to sleep again, deep sleep, where Orion didn’t have to put up with War’s constant bothering and wandering.

Another family wandered into the room and Jason, spotting them, waved his family over to the entrance to the next room. “Come on,” he said, “we’re blocking the exhibit. Let’s go see what else is up for viewing.”

The Johnsons followed Jason over to the new entrance. Troy asked, “Was the man in the picture really Great-Grandpa Hector? The plaque said that it was him, but he didn’t look like Great-Grandpa Hector.”

“It was him,” Proserpina confirmed. “Dad was one of the founding members of the ABC after all. Since he was the captain of the Atlantean Expedition, I’m certain that the people in charge of the displays made sure to include a mention of him.”

“But,” Troy protested, “he wasn’t old! Great-Grandpa Hector has always been ancient and wrinkly.”

“I’ve got to say,” said the ram-headed force of nature, “your little brother is hilarious.”

“Hush,” Orion said quietly, unable to stand simply thinking at his prisoner, and then a little louder said, “That’s rude, Troy. Great-Grandpa Hector was young and handsome once upon a time. Great-Grandma Lydia wouldn’t have married him if he wasn’t.”

“I’m sure,” Proserpina said dryly, “there were other factors involved in Mom’s decision to marry Dad. But, yes, Mom was a woman of great taste, and Dad was quite handsome back in the day.”

“Ew,” Rhea said, wrinkling her nose. “I didn’t need to know that.”

Jason looked amused and might have said something, but then a great ringing crash hit their ears. They all flinched and turned back to the room they’d just left.

Orion choked as the air thickened in his throat, threatening to suffocate him. War reached down, its skeletal hand edged in a burning crimson light, and cradled Orion’s throat in a startlingly gentle grasp. “Easy,” it murmured, “easy. There you go, Solaris, how’s that? Have I paid my rent?”

“Go screw yourself with a rusty shovel and a can of worms,” Orion muttered, reaching up to touch the bony hand, before he followed his family back into the bell room. “I didn’t ask you to pay rent.”

“What’s going on?” Cassie asked, straining to see over the adults crowded in front of the display case.

“I don’t know, but it sounds like we’re at ground zero of a thunderclap,” Rhea complained, hands over her ears.

“The second bell,” Mom said, stunned.

“What?” Orion shouted over the noise.

The ram-headed figure stooped to cradle him in its spindly arms. “Are you sure? Last time, you wanted very dearly for me to pay you rent. It is, after all, easier for mortals to make war with the immortal when one of those mortals has the power of an immortal at their disposal.”

“What?” Orion repeated, jerking to look at his burden.

“The second bell,” Mom said, pointing. “It’s ringing, entirely under its own power.”

War seemed to grin as it looked down at Orion. The shadows in the dark pits of its eye sockets seemed to grow, slowly creeping over the skull. “The sealed gods have sprung free of their trap, Solaris. you do remember what that will mean, don’t you? Humanity will once again go to war with the gods, and you—“ War traced a finger down Orion’s cheek. “—will rather be in need of my power then, won’t you?”

**Author's Note:**

> If you can't tell, this is a very exposition-y first chapter. I will add it to a series of one-shots all told from Orion's POV, which will fittingly be called Red Sun of Carnage. There will be other POV characters involved eventually; they're POV chapters will have their own series and be labelled accordingly. Eventually, I'll stick together a series that denotes the exact order that these should be read in.
> 
> Oh, and a brief side note: War is currently using astral projection to talk to Orion. That's why nobody other than Orion can see, hear, or interact with it. The exact mechanics of how that works will be explained later.


End file.
